2024-2025 Season

[Crewsorlose]

1 hour ago, ACE said:

The one non-P6 team in the preseason Top 25 (Gonzaga) will soon be in the P6. Then you have to go all the way down to McNeese, followed by us with 9 votes to find the non-P6 schools. This is just a preseason poll of course and hopefully several non-P6 schools will exceed expectations, but I remain pessimistic about non P-6 schools having the opportunity to earn at large bids in the future unless something changes in the current landscape.

Conferences like the Mountain West have done well in recent years, and the A-10 in pre-Covid years. The formula just isn't that hard: win OOC games, especially against strong teams in good conferences. The A-10 has bled out from a thousand little cuts of teams like GW getting drubbed by 40 against a team like Maryland, and the Daytons and VCUs need a month or two to get the ship steered right. 

The only advantage that the P-6 teams have is better programs. Sure, if the A-10 comes returns to what it was with Xavier and Butler, it will get raided again, but let's just hope we're one of the teams getting raided. 

[ACE]

2 minutes ago, Crewsorlose said:

Conferences like the Mountain West have done well in recent years, and the A-10 in pre-Covid years. The formula just isn't that hard: win OOC games, especially against strong teams in good conferences. The A-10 has bled out from a thousand little cuts of teams like GW getting drubbed by 40 against a team like Maryland, and the Daytons and VCUs need a month or two to get the ship steered right. 

The only advantage that the P-6 teams have is better programs. Sure, if the A-10 comes returns to what it was with Xavier and Butler, it will get raided again, but let's just hope we're one of the teams getting raided. 

It's a lot harder than it used to be:

The P5 conferences are bigger due to football expansion - so they play more conference games, which means less incentive to schedule home-homes with non-P6 schools early in the season. They have a big  scheduling advantage. And then when you get a non-P6 school like Indiana State that cracks the code and earns an at large big with a NET of 28... the goalposts suddenly move and they are at the mercy of the Committee's "eye test." 

 

[WVBilliken]

20 minutes ago, Crewsorlose said:

Conferences like the Mountain West have done well in recent years, and the A-10 in pre-Covid years. The formula just isn't that hard: win OOC games, especially against strong teams in good conferences. The A-10 has bled out from a thousand little cuts of teams like GW getting drubbed by 40 against a team like Maryland, and the Daytons and VCUs need a month or two to get the ship steered right. 

The only advantage that the P-6 teams have is better programs. Sure, if the A-10 comes returns to what it was with Xavier and Butler, it will get raided again, but let's just hope we're one of the teams getting raided. 

"The only advantage that the P-6 teams have is better programs".  Wow.  No they have many advantages.  But the one that helps them most IMO is that they will not play mid-majors or they will only play mid-majors at their place.  The result is the mid-majors lack strength of schedule or they must win at an extremely hostile away venue.

[thetorch]

4 hours ago, ACE said:

The one non-P6 team in the preseason Top 25 (Gonzaga) will soon be in the P6. Then you have to go all the way down to McNeese, followed by us with 9 votes to find the non-P6 schools. This is just a preseason poll of course and hopefully several non-P6 schools will exceed expectations, but I remain pessimistic about non P-6 schools having the opportunity to earn at large bids in the future unless something changes in the current landscape.

How many AP poll votes do we need to get an NCAA bid?

[thetorch]

Hlas covers Iowa and Iowa St.  Mostly football.

[gobillsgo]

16 minutes ago, thetorch said:

Hlas covers Iowa and Iowa St.  Mostly football.

I think (or hope?) that by the end of the season, his ranking us 17 is going to be a lot more accurate than the computer models that have us well above 100.  

[slu72]

Create a mid major power house conference that can rival the Beast. The programs are out there that can do that. It just takes a commish that will put it together. The Beast, while still our goal, is made up of schools that are no different from a lot of good mid schools. 

[Old guy]

6 hours ago, billiken_roy said:

in this day and age of college sports free agency that is a worthless act.   every team will pretty much have a majority of their roster completely turned over.   and basing their "prediction" on last year is foolish.   i hope they dont get paid for that work.

We know the Wiz does not  charge for access to his work and predictions. Ken Pom and any other person or companies charge something for access at least to some of their work. Even places like Team Rankings which provides free data and free information about who is expected to win and by how much before the games, does charge for their more elaborate betting information. There is a whole industry of purveyors of statistical sports analysis and betting analysis which make money by providing pre game and pre season statistical sports analysis for all kinds of sports.

The appearance of NILs may indeed ruin these analytical companies, but this has yet to happen. Just remember that in order to  analyze any sport of any kind you need performance data from games, and this is not available until the season starts. The only performance data that is available is the prior season's data, therefore that is what most statistical analysis companies have to base their pre season assessments upon. It is true that many of these companies will introduce fudge factors into their calculations to try to adjust for things like new coaches and player changes, but their data prior to the start of the season, largely comes from last season. 

You have every right to judge the validity of these early assessments, however as the teams play and current data becomes available these analytical assessments will become increasingly better and the variability between the different analytical companies will decrease until the end of the season. From what I  have seen, The Wiz use pure statistical analysis, Ken Pom adds proprietary fudge factor like a luck factor. Whether it is worthwhile or not to spend your money paying for access to any of these analytical companies is entirely up to you.

[OkieBilliken]

https://lmulions.com/sports/mens-basketball/roster/coaches/lorenzo-romar/5893
 

Just noticed our former head coach will be making a return visit to town in November 

[BLIKNS]

But , can he still dunk??

[gister]

1 hour ago, OkieBilliken said:

https://lmulions.com/sports/mens-basketball/roster/coaches/lorenzo-romar/5893
 

Just noticed our former head coach will be making a return visit to town in November 

He was a lot of fun to listen to at the old Billiken Club meetings at Humphreys.

[billiken_roy]

8 hours ago, Old guy said:

The Wiz use pure statistical analysis, Ken Pom adds proprietary fudge factor like a luck factor. Whether it is worthwhile or not to spend your money paying for access to any of these analytical companies is entirely up to you.

the wiz always tells the early season "predictions" are based on last year and are pretty worthless until about 8 games have been played. 

[Lord Elrond]

8 hours ago, OkieBilliken said:

https://lmulions.com/sports/mens-basketball/roster/coaches/lorenzo-romar/5893
 

Just noticed our former head coach will be making a return visit to town in November 

Interesting fact, I couldn’t find anything in his biographical writeup at the link of his being head coach at St Louis

[Old guy]

3 hours ago, billiken_roy said:

the wiz always tells the early season "predictions" are based on last year and are pretty worthless until about 8 games have been played. 

That is correct, and as we all know the Wiz's work is quite reliable and informative. If you combine the Wiz's work with accurate information of the spread prior to a game you can usually get a pretty good idea of how a game is likely to go.

[Aquinas]

I recall the hiring  of Romar and wondering  why we hired a west coast coach. I looked up Roman's record. He had a string of very good years, but he has also had strings of very bad years. Interesting that his overall winning  percentage  is lower than Travus Ford's. That makes me wonder if Ford will ever get back in the game.

[shempie]

27 minutes ago, Aquinas said:

I recall the hiring  of Romar and wondering  why we hired a west coast coach. I looked up Roman's record. He had a string of very good years, but he has also had strings of very bad years. Interesting that his overall winning  percentage  is lower than Travus Ford's. That makes me wonder if Ford will ever get back in the game.

He was hired because of a connection to the AD at the time, Doug Woolard.

Here are the other names that were interviewed in person. There might be another one or two.

Kevin Stallings, Buzz Williams, Dave Bliss (yikes), Greg Lackey, Derek Thomas, Bruce Webber.  Michael Jordan allegedly would have come to the press conference if Williams had been hired. 

[ACE]

17 hours ago, WVBilliken said:

"The only advantage that the P-6 teams have is better programs".  Wow.  No they have many advantages.  But the one that helps them most IMO is that they will not play mid-majors or they will only play mid-majors at their place.  The result is the mid-majors lack strength of schedule or they must win at an extremely hostile away venue.

One other big disadvantage is the switch is the switch from the RPI to the NET. Closer to home, look at the section on the A-10. I've posted articles about this previously - here's another.  https://syndication.bleacherreport.com/amp/2877965-many-college-basketball-teams-wish-the-selection-committee-still-used-rpi.amp.html

"As a rule of thumb, the NET has not been kind to the top mid-majors."

 

 

[VeniceMenace]

 

40 minutes ago, Aquinas said:

I recall the hiring  of Romar and wondering  why we hired a west coast coach. I looked up Roman's record. He had a string of very good years, but he has also had strings of very bad years. Interesting that his overall winning  percentage  is lower than Travus Ford's. That makes me wonder if Ford will ever get back in the game.

Accounting for strength of schedule, Romar was the better coach at SLU. In 2001, for example, SLU faced California, Washington, Mizzou, Texas A&M, Iowa, Memphis...and two games each vs. Louisville, Cincy, Marquette and Houston. That season SLU finished above .500. Ford's teams consistently lost vs. ranked opponents plus Dayton, VCU and St. B.

[cheeseman]

1 hour ago, Aquinas said:

I recall the hiring  of Romar and wondering  why we hired a west coast coach. I looked up Roman's record. He had a string of very good years, but he has also had strings of very bad years. Interesting that his overall winning  percentage  is lower than Travus Ford's. That makes me wonder if Ford will ever get back in the game.

Romar just couldn't recruit west coast kids - his geography of strength - so he was having to build his reputation in the Midwest that took time.  He finally started to make inroads but then was hired away.

[Box and Won]

2 hours ago, shempie said:

He was hired because of a connection to the AD at the time, Doug Woolard.

Here are the other names that were interviewed in person. There might be another one or two.

Kevin Stallings, Buzz Williams, Dave Bliss (yikes), Greg Lackey, Derek Thomas, Bruce Webber.  Michael Jordan allegedly would have come to the press conference if Williams had been hired. 

Buzz Peterson.  He didn't have much success after not getting the SLU job.

[shempie]

4 minutes ago, Box and Won said:

Buzz Peterson.  He didn't have much success after not getting the SLU job.

Yep. Buzz Peterson, not Buzz Williams. He flamed out at North Carolina. 

[OkieBilliken]

6 hours ago, Lord Elrond said:

Interesting fact, I couldn’t find anything in his biographical writeup at the link of his being head coach at St Louis

The crazy thing that stood out for me was Markelle Fultz was the overall #1 pick in the draft.  I know I don’t follow pro hoops as much as some, but huh?   Has he done anything as a pro?  Was the talent really bad that year?.

[TheChosenOne]

25 minutes ago, OkieBilliken said:

The crazy thing that stood out for me was Markelle Fultz was the overall #1 pick in the draft.  I know I don’t follow pro hoops as much as some, but huh?   Has he done anything as a pro?  Was the talent really bad that year?.

It was certainly considered a strong draft class at the time and it looks to have held up pretty well with Tatum being the star of the class.

[WVBilliken]

Josiah Dotzler sure looks ripped in his Billiken Happy Birthday picture, see link.  Curious to those who have seen him play .... how big of a factor do you think he will be this season.  

https://www.facebook.com/share/p/C19kRq4pGCAzuHtj/

 

 

[billiken_roy]

33 minutes ago, WVBilliken said:

Josiah Dotzler sure looks ripped in his Billiken Happy Birthday picture, see link.  Curious to those who have seen him play .... how big of a factor do you think he will be this season.  

https://www.facebook.com/share/p/C19kRq4pGCAzuHtj/

 

 

the first public practice imo he didnt fit in.  he was out of sync with the rest of the team and didnt mesh with what we have been told schertz team system is about.   he did a lot of one on ones and took some difficult to the basket drives and shots.   

the second practice apparently he is getting the message and he seemed to fit in a lot better with the team flow.   i still think he outside looking in as a starter but he should get time.   and you are right about his body.   he is a strong young man.